Cuomo signs bill for new family court judges

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Thursday signed the bill that will create 25 new family court judges, including one each next year in Albany and Schenectady counties.

Nine of the judges will be in New York City, 16 will be upstate. Deciding where upstate, however, bogged down negotiations on the bill in the Senate, stalling its passage until the last day of the legislative session last Friday.

The Senate bill added additional upstate judgeships -— including one in Warren County effective 2016 -— to the version passed by the Assembly, which included just the 20 that the state Office of Court Administration recommended based on case loads.

The two chambers ultimately agreed on 25, with five of the upstate judges not taking their seats on the bench until 2016. The New York City judges are appointed, but the legislative delay meant that the bill reached the governor’s desk nearly a month after the upstate candidates would have otherwise begun collecting petitions to get on November’s ballot.

Cuomo’s signature will trigger an abbreviated petitioning process starting July 11 and ending July 24, under which the number of signatures the candidates need to collect will also be reduced.

Advocates, including the New York State Bar Association, pushed for the legislation citing the increasing demands on the state’s family court system and rising case loads for judges. Albany will now have four judges, while Schenectady will have three.

Lawmakers included $5 million in this year’s state budget to partially fund 20 new judgeships through the end of the current fiscal year in March.

Jordan Carleo-Evangelist

3 Responses

More money wasted on political jobs .. more money wasted on political jobs!Needed to say it twice to get my point across! The Government is burying the taxpayer in debt! Don’t give me that BS “the money has already been appropriated” — it’s STILL TAXPAYER dollars!

Cuomo is throwing our tax dollars into the trash giving all his one percenter friends, the filthy rich, apointed jobs for the corrupt money given to Cuomo. Coumo is corrupt and every thing he does is corrupt.
Vote him out, he is destroying our State